


Heal My Wounds and Watch Over My Heart

by McEuropeskies



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Anxiety Attacks, Blood and Injury, Canon-Typical Violence, Fluff and Angst, From the perspectives of healers who have had enough, Love Confessions, M/M, Resolved Romantic Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-12
Updated: 2020-12-07
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:01:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25232041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/McEuropeskies/pseuds/McEuropeskies
Summary: Five times that McCree had near-death experiences and made Hanzo worried sick, and the one time that the roles were reversed.
Relationships: Jesse McCree/Hanzo Shimada
Comments: 64
Kudos: 357





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Here's a fic that followers voted for on twitter! I hope that you enjoy!

**_Baptiste_ **

Jean-Baptiste Augustin knew the horrors of war and violence all too well. He had seen the innocents who were powerless to stop the loss of life, entire families and cities uprooted and turned upside down, and he had felt the desire to be everywhere at once, to stop every person he held dear from acquiring even another scratch from the talons of war. The hard part for him was realizing that he could not save everyone, no matter how hard he tried to, and try he did; most of his days as a young adult were spent studying different medical practices, perfecting new ways to heal wounds in the heat of battle. It took years of trauma, of guilt and frustration at the world, to forgive himself and realize that innocent deaths were not his fault. They were the faults of systems of power held in place by such violence. Sadly, all he could do was try to fix the system while working within it. But it was not his fault.

When Baptiste looked at Hanzo, he saw someone who was still trying to be everywhere at once, who was trying to hold a world of guilt on his shoulders, and he was crumpling under the weight.

Baptiste did see a bit of himself in Hanzo: a person who had made mistakes in the past and had been used as a pawn for a greater game, but also a person whose past didn’t define him (whether Hanzo realized that yet or not). Baptiste still had guilt, and it often kept him awake at night, eating at his brain. He had accepted, though, that he had been a product of his terrible situation, and in such a situation, violence was sometimes a necessity, a life-preserving, defensive device.

Hanzo had not yet accepted his past, and he was trying to atone for it by doing…too much.

The first mission that Baptiste and Hanzo worked on together was the first time that Baptiste realized that there may be someone in particular who Hanzo was trying to prove his goodness too: Jesse McCree. Baptiste was assigned to the recon mission in case there was anything that went wrong and someone ended up hurt, but he hadn’t been particularly worried. Hanzo and McCree were both skilled fighters and observant; they didn’t need babying.

This was especially clear when Hanzo, from his position on the Paris rooftops, radioed in any and every Null Sector unit he spotted in back-alleys within a one-mile radius of Baptiste and McCree’s position on the ground. He made it clear that there was an attack being planned and where it was to take place, so there was little left for them to do except for scout the areas that Hanzo had mentioned. All the while, Hanzo reminded them which units were closest to them, to have sufficient ammo ready, and to be on guard. And Baptiste thought that _he_ was a backseat driver. 

They developed points of defense for when the larger group of Overwatch agents flew in as well as areas that would need the most protection, and then they were ready to regroup. McCree only laughed when Baptiste rolled his eyes after Hanzo radioed in for what had to be the _hundredth_ time. “Is he always so…observant?” Baptiste asked.

“I don’t think so,” McCree answered. “Once Winston ranted to me about how he couldn’t get Hanzo to answer on his communicator during a mission. Here he had it turned off and was out runnin’ around doin’ his own thing and takin’ down enemies everywhere. Think he got chewed out after that, but I’ve only ever seen him act like this.”

_Odd,_ Baptiste thought, but he wrote it off as Hanzo fluctuating between two extremes in order to prove himself.

“At least we know he’s lookin’ out for us. Makes me feel real safe,” McCree finished with a nod towards the rooftops.

“Yeah,” Baptiste said with a half-smile. “He gets the job done.”

McCree didn’t respond and let the conversation fade. He seemed to be lost in thought, but his eyes sparkled and a smile stuck to his face. They soon met back up with Hanzo and shared their maps and plans before calling Tracer in to pick them up. It was quick, it was thorough.

All until Hanzo looked above them and called out “Sniper!”

A purple omnic sat perched in a top-story window in a building down the street from them, barrel of a sniper rifle trained in their direction. As if in slow motion, Baptiste watched Hanzo notch an arrow and fire at the enemy, but not before he saw the kickback of the rifle from a shot being fired. Baptiste grabbed McCree’s arm and pulled him to cover as a bullet whizzed by where his head had been just a moment ago.

The sniper fell, but Baptiste saw the color fade from Hanzo’s face as his gaze moved from McCree to the bullet wedged in the wall behind them. The longer he stared at the hole in the bricks, the more Baptiste thought that the man might bend over and vomit. He looked sick from guilt because he was the one who had not saved McCree, because he had even let the sniper get a shot off, because he could not be everywhere at once.

While McCree collected himself, Baptiste patted Hanzo’s shoulder and smiled. “Hey we’re all alright. Nothing wrong with having a little backup,” he said. When Hanzo did not look any better, Baptiste wondered for a moment if all the war and trauma had made his own mind desensitized. No, he decided. There was still fear in his mind; he had just learned from too much experience to separate what had happened from what _could have_.

Wordlessly, Hanzo softened his gaze and stared at McCree, and the cowboy met his eyes. Hanzo brushed the hair away from McCree’s forehead where, seconds ago, it could have become the home to a bullet, and he let his fingers linger.

“I’m okay, darlin’. I promise,” McCree said and gave a reassuring smile. Hanzo nodded and moved away, and Baptiste suddenly felt like a third wheel.

All of Hanzo’s anxiety and McCree’s wistful staring suddenly made much more sense. Seriously, the romantic tension was through the roof. It was almost enough to make Baptiste laugh, and he only held it back out of politeness. He did however throw out a sarcastic _you’re welcome_ to McCree who laughed and finally said, “Thanks for the save, Bap.”

He laughed along with the cowboy but noticed from the corner of his eye that Hanzo gazed intently at nothing, lost in thought, and he did not join in.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Five times that McCree had near-death experiences and made Hanzo worried sick, and the one time that the roles were reversed.

**_Morrison_ **

Many agents had told him that they were initially surprised by his medical skills on the battle field, but, truthfully, Jack Morrison did not have much to boast about. He was trained in first aid, he acted well under stress and pressure, and he knew his way around a biotic emitter. His skills were nothing compared to talented doctors and medical engineers in Overwatch, but he did his best to get the job done.

Jack liked to believe that he was, well, a _Jack-_ of-all-trades. He had a variety of skills and could take on whatever role he was needed in, but he was never the _best_ at anything. Healing, killing, leading, surviving. There was always someone there to replace him or outdo him.

Not that he cared. It was less pressure on him to have people around who were actually competent. McCree and Hanzo, he supposed, were competent enough. Jesse talked a bit too much for his liking, but there were worse people to be teamed up with. Reinhardt was an example, although he did love the guy; his booming voice simply didn’t help with Jack’s perpetual headaches.

But if there was another thing that Jack hated, it was being grouped with two other agents who very clearly had a romantic interest in one another. If he had to witness Jesse trip over himself to give Hanzo a boost to higher ground or Hanzo “accidentally” brush his hand against Jesse’s _one more time_ , he was going to either scream or burst a blood vessel trying not to.

The three of them were currently clearing hostile Null Sector units from a dark Paris building that had been forcefully overtaken. It was draining but not particularly difficult. Once his adrenaline wore off, Jack knew that he would be able to sleep for days. At the very least, he would take a _long_ nap.

“Room’s clear,” Jesse said as he peeked into what looked like a communal kitchen from around the corner of the hallway where they stood. “Let’s head to the fourth floor.”

“I’ll go first,” Hanzo said, moving in front of Jesse and towards the staircase.

Jesse stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. “Woah there, babydoll, if there’s an ambush waitin’ at the top of those stairs, then I wanna be the first up there. A gun can fire off quicker than a bow.”

Hanzo looked like he knew that, of course, but he was too stubborn to let Jesse retake the place at the front of the line. “You think that I am not quick enough?” Hanzo asked.

“Of course I know you are, but I…I mean it would be less arrows for ya t’run and collect,” Jesse sputtered out like he was coming up with it on the spot.

Jack didn’t have time for this.

With a huff, he pushed through the bickering pair and up the stairs. Sure enough, there was an ambush of low-ranked omnics waiting, and Jack easily took them all down. He could have saved a minute of his life if they had just walked up there without the back-and-forth.

“That worked too,” Jesse said from behind him.

Together, they cleared out the rest of the floor, and as they neared the stairs that would lead them back down to the entrance, Hanzo reached out and gently adjusted Jesse’s hat. “It was crooked,” he explained while Jesse beamed at him. Jack held back his scream, and, luckily, no blood vessels burst.

In his lapse of observation, Jack was too late at catching the glimpse of the stray omnic creeping up on them from the corner of his eye. He was not, however, too late to send an elbow to the unit’s faceplate as it shot off a bullet, redirecting its aim to Jesse’s thigh instead of his chest.

Jesse cried out string of expletives while Jack finished off the omnic. “Hurts like a motherfucker!” Jesse groaned. He sure did take after Gabe.

“You’re fine,” Jack said, working on tearing off a piece of fabric from his undershirt to fashion a tight bandage.

“I know I’m fine,” Jesse retorted and propped himself up against the railing in the stairwell. “Woulda been even more fine if I hadn’t gotten shot.”

“Pay attention better next time then,” Jack said. He suddenly noticed how still and quiet Hanzo had become.

“Hanzo,” he said as he reached down and tied the fabric around Jesse’s leg.

Hanzo just stood there, staring, his face becoming progressively paler by the second. He looked like he was swaying slightly, as if lightheaded. Jack swore that if he fainted and had to carry the both of them, he would immediately request a few weeks of paid time off following the mission. 

“Hanzo!” he said again. Luckily, the man looked at him and did not faint. “Watch my back while I help Jesse.”

Hanzo nodded, and Jack heaved McCree up onto his back. They journeyed back to the entrance of the building without encountering any other enemies, and they made it to their extraction point while informing Tracer of their success. Once on the ship, Jack sat Jesse down onto a medical cot and got to work cutting away the fabric from Jesse’s pants that was blocking his view of the wound.

All the while, Hanzo just stood off to the side, looking lost. If Jack had to guess, Hanzo was not always like this when someone got injured in front of him. He supposed that many fighters were afraid of blood, but a former yakuza boss? No, Hanzo did not seem one to shy away from gore. He knew the look in Hanzo’s eyes, the look of someone who had seen loved ones die and did not want to go through it again. He had felt it when he let go of Vincent, when he watched Gabriel leave for another mission. It was fear, the worst kind of fear.

This was the other downfall of being teamed up with couples – even if they weren’t officially a couple yet. Jack had never witnessed Hanzo acting so…useless. He did not help stop the bleeding, or hand Jack more bandages, or even update Tracer on the details of the mission in the meantime. He only looked into Jesse’s eyes and brushed his fingers against his cheek.

Jesse smiled and put his hand over Hanzo’s. “I’m alright, sweetpea. Just a scratch.”

Hanzo’s frowned deepened and he huffed. As Jack finished patching Jesse up, he caught Hanzo shift his gaze to his hands stained with Jesse’s blood. Suddenly, the man whirled away and stomped off to the small bathroom in the back of the ship. Jack sighed and figured that he’d have to wait to wash his dirtied hands, so he got up and waited by the door of the bathroom to let Hanzo finish his brooding. What he heard, though, was a faint heaving, like someone was hovering over the toilet and on the verge of spilling his guts.

This was the last time he’d allow these two to go on a mission together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And as always, just in case you wanna know, here's where I'm most active in the fandom! Come say hi if you want :) [@McEuropeskies](https://twitter.com/McEuropeskies)  
> 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Five times that McCree had near-death experiences and made Hanzo worried sick, and the one time that the roles were reversed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> <3 <3 <3

**_Ana_ **

In a perfect world, Ana Amari would be far away from Watchpoint Gibraltar, living safely and comfortably with her daughter. She had often dreamt about it – what it would feel like to relax away from the gunfire and bloodshed. Ana saw herself living near the beach, listening to seagulls flying freely and waves crashing rather than the cries of war. Fareeha would perhaps pick up surfing or parasailing, something that satisfied her need to feel the adrenaline pumping. They would stay in touch with close friends, certainly, but they would slowly forget about the dismal base erected on the cliffs of Gibraltar.

Instead, though, Ana was still here, in her office that had changed little since her early days in Overwatch, sharing a mug of black tea with Hanzo Shimada. The man occasionally took polite sips of the steaming liquid, but he was mostly focused on his growing frustration. It had been a month since Hanzo had been banned from joining Jesse on the field, and today marked another day that the cowboy was away on a mission without him. Ana held her mug of tea between her palms, taking in its warmth as she waited for Hanzo to break the silence.

“I hate Morrison,” Hanzo finally said, and Ana laughed. It was not a shocking statement.

Ana took a sip of her tea and nodded. “Sometimes I hate him too.”

“Really?” Hanzo asked, eyes widening.

“Of course. We view the world differently,” she said, and Hanzo stared, waiting for her to elaborate. “Gabriel and I, we always cared more about our loved ones than we did the mission. Jack, on the other hand, always looked at the bigger picture, at sacrifices that needed to be made. Sometimes I wonder if the mentorship that he provided my daughter with while she was younger truly stemmed from care for her or if he simply saw that she would be a great future soldier. Perhaps if Fareeha had different role models she would not have been dragged into such a lifestyle.”

Hanzo stared down into the dark liquid filling his mug. Ana studied his face, eyes lingering on his prominent eye bags that reminded her of her own. His exhaustion spoke of fear, of worry, of doubt. She sighed, wondering what Hanzo had been like as a child. Perhaps he was rambunctious, or curious as Fareeha had been. Maybe he had been rough and lacking hope like Jesse, or, like so many of Overwatch’s agents, perhaps he did not have a childhood at all. Ana frowned and shook her head.

“I just…I wanted to protect him,” Hanzo said. “Jesse, I mean.”

“I know,” Ana replied softly. “For now, you just have to roll with the punches and trust that Jesse will be okay.”

Hanzo’s lips curled into a snarl. Ana watched his gaze shift to a framed picture on her desk. It was of her and Fareeha in her younger years, and in it Fareeha rested across her mother’s back, both of their arms outstretched as if they were flying. Behind them was an endless blue sky, and their faces were scrunched with laughter. It was Ana’s favorite picture.

“Would you say the same if Morrison stopped you from attending missions with you daughter?” Hanzo growled, and Ana felt her blood begin to boil at his words.

With a glare directed at Hanzo, she set her mug on a coaster on her desk. Hanzo was already sinking down in his chair, averting his gaze. “Fareeha is my daughter,” she said, calm yet forceful. “She _came_ from me. Do not compare my love, my _protectiveness_ of her to what you feel for a man you’ve known for six months. It is not the same. Do not challenge my care for her.”

Hanzo continued looking at the ground, a silence lingering between them. After some time, he finally met her gaze once more with reddened cheeks. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

Ana sighed and reached over to take one of Hanzo’s hands in her own, giving it a squeeze. “That is not to say that I don’t see how hard this is for you and the pain that you’re going through. It is so scary to have aspects of our lives that we can’t control. Fareeha is her own woman just as Jesse is his own man. I know that it’s terrifying when all you want to do is hold them close when they are drawn to danger.”

Hanzo digested her words with tired eyes. “You are a good mother,” he said.

Ana squeezed his hand once more with a sad smile. “The hardest thing to do in this line of work is to love. When your heart is full of love and care, it’s harder to kill,” she said, noticing that she had absentmindedly moved her fingers to brush over her eyepatch, “and it’s harder to see the people around you fight, knowing that they could get hurt at any moment. I’m only here for my daughter, to protect her in any way that I can, and every day I wait for her to come to me and tell me that she’s finished with fighting, that she’s had enough. Then, I would follow her away from this place. Until that time comes, I wait and I hope and I work for her. It’s exhausting, and I wish it were different, but I can’t control Fareeha; I can only talk to her and tell her how I’m feeling. Have you tried that – telling Jesse how you feel?”

“I…” Hanzo began, but he was interrupted by a call from Ana’s desk phone.

As Ana moved the call through, Angela’s voice echoed through the small room. “Ana, I need an extra pair of hands in the medbay immediately. Please come as soon as you can.”

“I am on my way,” Ana said, ending the call. She met Hanzo’s eyes once more, now wide with worry. The look between them spoke a thousand words – his fear met with her calmness, fury met with understanding – and on the way to the medbay, Ana heard Hanzo’s footsteps remain only a few paces behind her.

Sure enough, the patient was Jesse, and Ana felt her heart sink. Jesse was gasping, frothy saliva forming at the corners of his lips, half-conscious while Angela held his head to the side. “Help me get him up,” Angela said to Ana as their patient began gagging.

Ana moved quickly and helped Angela prop Jesse against the back of the bed, finishing just in time to put a bucket in front of the cowboy as he vomited his stomach’s contents. Hanzo rushed over and pushed to Jesse’s side. “What happened? What happened to him?!”

“Hanzo, move I need to work,” Angela spat. “I can talk later, just move!”

Ana began pulling Hanzo away by his arm to the bed across from McCree. “It was just a venom mine,” she said. “He’ll be okay. We just need to flush it from his system and decontaminate his skin.”

“He…he does not…look okay,” Hanzo slurred, suddenly feeling very sleepy. Ana gently guided Hanzo down to lay on the bed, aligning his head with the pillow.

“He will be fine, I promise, habibi,” Ana replied, and when Hanzo’s eyes finally drifted shut, she pulled the sleep dart from his thigh and got back to work.

* * *

Once Jesse was stable and sleeping, Ana planted a tired kiss on the cowboy’s forehead and mentally reminded herself to have a long talk with him about being less reckless. There was only so much that one person could take before they took their last breath, either from physical injury or stress. Then, she focused her attention back on Hanzo who remained dozing peacefully. She approached his bedside and carefully maneuvered the man underneath of the covers, tucking him in with care. She brushed a strand of hair from his face and planted a kiss on his forehead as well.

Turning away, Ana thought about making a new pot of tea. Hers had certainly gone cold by now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And as always, just in case you wanna know, here's where I'm most active in the fandom! Come say hi if you want :) [@McEuropeskies](https://twitter.com/McEuropeskies)  
> 


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Five times that McCree had near-death experiences and made Hanzo worried sick, and the one time that the roles were reversed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter in honor of #MchanzoWeek2020! Although it's a day late, this goes along with the "scars, promises" prompt.

**_Lúcio_ **

Although he had been financially uncertain and relatively unknown, sometimes Lúcio missed the days when he could just get lost in his music. He longed for the times when he could simply amplify his new beats from his mixer on any street corner in Rio de Janeiro and watch as the people came together, laughing and dancing and sometimes even singing from their hearts. It lifted his spirits to see everyone so happy and lively, so carefree.

Then Vishkar came and all of that changed. Never once did Lúcio find himself regretting being at the forefront of the rebellion – why would he? At twenty years old, he did what he could to motivate the working class to rise up, to fight back against the suppression that the corporations had tried to normalize. However, he did wish that he hadn’t been forced to find himself so quickly. Now he had an internationally-recognized image: he was Lúcio, the famous DJ and freedom fighter who had record labels and sold out stadiums worldwide. He couldn’t just turn his back on that now.

And sometimes, he got tired of being so upbeat, but that’s how he always was on television, in his songs, and at his concerts. If he wasn’t always laughing and making others happy, then who was he? Hopefully he still had plenty of time to figure that out, but, as he looked around the solemn faces on the dropship, he couldn’t help but feel a bit fearful. Nobody ever knew what cards their missions would deal, and they could only keep on moving forward.

Lúcio decided to do something about the gloom surrounding him. He took his speaker from the backpack near his feet and found one of his new beats on his phone. It was just the right mixture of joyful and relaxing; his familiarity with the science behind binaural beats made him sure of that. It wasn’t long before he began noticing the other agents around him begin perking up. Genji tapped his foot, McCree nodded his head, and, although Hanzo did not react, his dragons came out to listen closely.

Everyone knew why Hanzo had not been on as many missions the past few months. Jack had advised Winston that it was bad for his mental health to be teamed up with Jesse and be the victim of constant worrying. Recently, though, Ana had posed the notion that it was perhaps even worse for Hanzo’s sanity to be kept away from Jesse.

To put it simply, it was a weird situation, and Lúcio was not exactly sure what Hanzo’s relationship was to Jesse. He seemed to be quite fond of him but, at the same time, so fed up with him. He smiled at the cowboy when his back was turned but turned his own back whenever Jesse noticed. Although, Lúcio was not quite sure what Hanzo’s relationship was to _anyone_ for that matter. He was a pretty strange dude.

Not necessarily strange in a bad way though, Lúcio mentally decided. No, Hanzo was the type of dude who took showers at 3:00 A.M., enjoyed doing laundry, and climbed to the Watchpoint roof when he wanted to be alone. _Quirky_ was a good way to phrase it. Extremely quirky.

Genji leaned in closer to Lúcio, gesturing at the two blue dragons watching him intently. “That means they enjoy it,” he said, and although he was wearing his faceplate, Lúcio could hear him smiling.

Lúcio laughed and smiled down at the tiny dragons. “Aw, is that true, guys? Do you like my music? What d’ya say we hook it up to Genji’s lights next time and get a real party going?”

Hanzo and Genji voiced their disinterest simultaneously. Lúcio couldn’t really see why Genji wouldn’t want to be a glowing human disco ball, but hey, everyone was their own person. Relaxing soundtrack it is, then. 

As Tracer announced their descent, Lúcio watched the little dragons turn their attention to Jesse, mewling and rubbing against his side. When one began to climb onto Jesse’s shoulders, Hanzo scolded them for wasting their energy and quickly recalled them back into his body. Lúcio shared a look with Genji. Maybe Hanzo wasn’t so hard to read after all.

* * *

Lúcio had been in worse situations than this. At least in Overwatch, equipment was provided to him. He always had everything he needed: medical supplies, technology repairs, and anything else he required to be efficient at his job. During the rebellion, everyone just had to make do with what they had. Every day was work, and they had no certain source of funding ready to help them out whenever they needed it. They had to rely on the people, on each other, for support.

Overwatch was slightly similar in that way. They were all a team; the agents knew each other well and were ready to protect their teammates at all times. But here, Lúcio had orders to follow from those who weren’t always out on the field with him. He had to listen to invisible leaders, even if he himself had already thought up a better course of action. Sometimes it was excruciating.

This was one of the more necessary missions, however. He, Genji, Hanzo, and Jesse had been tasked with locating the two deployed bombs mapped on their tracking devices and defusing them according to their instructions: “Cut any wires except the blue ones,” Winston had said.

The first bomb was easy enough to take care of. It was in a locked room in the basement of an old Paris cabaret, and there had been little to no Null Sector agents keeping watch. They defused the explosive like they were unplugging a phone charger, albeit with slightly more anxiety.

The second bomb was a bit more of a hassle. At least the badges that Winston had provided them to get into the office tower had seemed to work well enough, and once inside, Hanzo and McCree took the stairs while he and Genji took the elevator to the basement. Genji hummed along to the instrumental tune of “Girl from Ipanema” playing in the quiet elevator as they descended, standing and waiting patiently, and once the elevator doors opened on the bottom floor they saw that they were surrounded by Null Sector units with large guns trained on them.

The two men groaned. Lúcio watched Genji slowly reach back for his katana under the guise of raising his hands in surrender, and he prepared himself to follow the cyborg’s lead when suddenly, the door to the stairs burst open and Jesse and Hanzo came in guns (and bow) blazing. So much for their silent plan, but this worked too.

Lúcio followed as Jesse and Hanzo downed omnics left and right while Genji deflected bullets aimed their way. When any Null Sector units got too close, Lúcio launched them backwards with his sonic technology – they were untouchable. Lúcio took a deep breath as the last enemy went down, disappointed that none had surrendered but also pleased that more lives could be spared on the many floors above them.

He quickly defused the final bomb.

* * *

Outside, Lúcio congratulated everyone on a job well-done. As Genji dusted off his shoulders for him, he looked over and watched Hanzo do the same for Jesse following up by carefully straightening his hat. Perhaps this was a Shimada’s way of showing that they cared.

Lúcio smiled to himself and opened his mouth to speak, but the four of them were knocked off of their feet by a thunderous _boom_. There was ringing in his ears, and for a moment he thought it was an earthquake. Then the wave of dust hit them as the building some distance behind them began to fall. They ran, moving screaming civilians with them as they went.

They chanced a look behind them, and McCree dove out of the way as a piece of debris broke the cement where his body had once stood. Without a word, they continued running.

* * *

There had been few causalities, Winston told them when they boarded the ship again hours later. He had sent in a second team of medics to scout the area, responding to the panic along with the Paris emergency team. The building had been abandoned, and the only ones hurt had been those caught around it as it fell.

None of them were pleased with this news, least of all Hanzo. “You said that there were only two bombs!” he screamed. “There could have been _no_ casualties if you had done your job correctly!”

Winston glared. “Look, Hanzo,” he began, his tone cold, “you don’t have to pretend that you care that some civilians lost their lives today – we all know that you’re just upset that Agent McCree got a nasty scrape on his arm – but don’t pretend that we can possibly know everything.”

McCree whistled low at that, eyes narrowed. Lúcio himself felt angry for Hanzo. What the fuck kind of manipulative explanation was that?

Genji stood just as Hanzo charged. He held his brother back with his dense metal body, Hanzo yelling all the while. “Fuck you! What the fuck kind of leader are you?!”

Lúcio watched Winston’s face fall, as if he immediately regretted his words. However, he didn’t apologize or even say another word. He simply turned and walked into the cockpit, sliding the door shut behind him.

Pulling himself free of Genji’s grasp, Hanzo stood seething for a while. He ignored Genji’s comforting touches and slumped down into his seat between McCree and Lúcio, turning to Jesse immediately. “I am not so cold that I only care about you,” he said gruffly.

Jesse nodded, face softening. “I know that, babydoll.”

With a shaky had, Hanzo touched the bandage over the wound McCree had gotten after jumping out of the way of the falling rubble. It was far from bad – Lúcio had cleaned and bandaged it, informing Jesse that he would not need stitches and knowing that at the worst it may leave a scar.

Lúcio watched Hanzo with a frown. He wanted this man to know what it was like to not be failed by absent leaders, to feel that he was a part of something meaningful, to know what it felt like to be free from duty and dance in the streets at night. Looking at him, Lúcio just knew that Hanzo had never felt any of those things – perhaps it was all the more reason for Lúcio to strive for that way of life once more.

He reached down into his backpack and pulled out his headphones, hooking them up to his phone. Scrolling through his playlist and searching for a soft, calming playlist, Lúcio finally found the perfect mix of beats and passed it over to Hanzo.

The man just looked at him for a moment, either confused or unsure. Finally, though, Hanzo took the headphones and slid them on with a nod of thanks. As the minutes ticked by, Hanzo leaned further back into his chair, head lulling against Jesse’s shoulder, and while he dozed, his dragons appeared, yawning and stretching like cats.

One crawled over and plopped down onto McCree’s lap, and the other stayed curled up on Hanzo’s, eyes drifting shut. Lúcio found himself smiling, and when he reached over and gently scratched the top of the furry dragon’s head, it softly nudged against his finger before falling into a deep sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If any of you listened to The Adventure Zone [THIS](https://youtu.be/Dl9kVWIOPAQ) is what I imagined when writing Lúcio and Genji going down the elevator lmaooooo
> 
>   
> As usual, here's where I'm most active in the fandom! Come say hi if you want :) [@McEuropeskies](https://twitter.com/McEuropeskies)  
> 


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Five times that McCree had near-death experiences and made Hanzo worried sick, and the one time that the roles were reversed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As a Buddhist person, I was so excited to write about Zenyatta! I love really expanding upon his Tibetan-Buddhist coded character. I reference The Heart Sutra throughout, in case you were curious. 
> 
> Anyway, please enjoy :)

**_Zenyatta_ **

Many believed that Tekhartha Zenyatta had no thoughts, that his head was a tangled mess of wires processing data and transferring electrical currents that simply kept him functioning. Any hint of personality, to them, was nothing but complex programming and mimicry of what he learned from his surroundings.

But the truth was that Zenyatta thought quite often – he even dreamt when he was idle and experienced feelings and emotions. It was hard to get people to believe that he was a multidimensional being. Sometimes he even had trouble believing it himself – what if he did only think and feel the thoughts and emotions that he learned along the way?

Did it actually matter, though?

_Form is no other than emptiness,_

_Emptiness no other than form._

Zenyatta suffered like any other being. He had fears and anger and regrets, and he had learned to confront those feelings. He meditated daily and remembered the lessons that he learned from the Shambali, from Mondatta. All sentient beings suffered from change, from existence, and from the presence of suffering itself, yet all could find comfort in the calming waves of emptiness.

_Form is only emptiness,_

_Emptiness only form._

_Feeling, thought, and choice,_

_Consciousness itself,_

_Are the same as this._

Hanzo was the embodiment of great suffering, just as Genji once was. From the man, Zenyatta sensed anger and hatred, fear and sadness. Hanzo was a storm of negativity, each crack of thunder heralding another outburst and every torrential downpour another breakdown. If Zenyatta could only teach him to feel the soft wind against his face and take deep breaths, clearing his mind of all troubles if even for just a moment, then that would be a great triumph.

Zenyatta walked a few paces ahead of Hanzo in the gentle sunlight, carrying only his gold-colored singing bowl. The sky was clear and the breeze caressed the deep green leaves of the trees and the small wildflowers, giving the plants a slight push and freeing loose petals into the wind. It was a perfect day for letting go of one’s worries.

“Where are we going?” Hanzo asked, speaking for the first time in a short while. Even his voice hinted at the underlying storm – it was gruff and powerful like thunder.

Genji had talked Hanzo into joining Zenyatta for one of his meditation sessions while McCree was away in France on another mission. In an odd turn of events, it had been Hanzo who had volunteered to sit the mission out. Genji explained that it had something to do with Hanzo proving himself to Winston after their argument took place nearly a month ago. Zenyatta had heard from both Genji and Lúcio after the event, the two men angry that Winston had talked down to Hanzo for exhibiting care and love in a time of fear and strife.

“We are going to a place that calms me,” Zenyatta answered. “I hope that it calms you as well.”

Hanzo said nothing more, but Zenyatta could feel the man’s eyes boring into his back and hear his breath hitch. After a moment, he turned and saw why: a family of red foxes had decided to join them on their journey, sticking close to Zenyatta’s feet and looking up at him expectantly.

_All things are by nature void_

_They are not born or destroyed_

_Nor are they stained or pure_

_Nor do they wax or wane._

“It seems that we have company,” Zenyatta said with a chuckle, and he reached down to scratch behind the ears of the closest fox. “There is a story of a man,” he continued, “who is asked if Enlightened beings are free from cause and effect. ‘Yes, they are free,’ the man answers, and then he realizes that he is wrong after he is forced to live out five hundred lifetimes as a fox.”

Hanzo stood quiet for some time before reaching down to pet one of the foxes as well. “Why tell me that?”

“All of us are interconnected,” Zenyatta said. “We cause each other pain and happiness and are affected by the pain and happiness of others. It’s a fact that you do not need to hide from.”

“I’m not hiding from anything,” said Hanzo gruffly.

Zenyatta nodded and continued on his way, Hanzo and the foxes following closely behind. Eventually, they approached the glen that Zenyatta had been searching for. A small, clear pond sat surrounded by thriving trees of all shapes and sizes, their foliage letting in the perfect amount of sunlight to allow other beings to grow and rest. The yellow and red flowers sprouting near the water added beautifully natural splashes of color to the backdrop, and Zenyatta found himself immediately much more relaxed.

As he walked closer to the pond, he heard the _ker-plunk_ of a frog jumping below its surface and out of sight. If Zenyatta could smile, he would, but for now he settling on sitting in the soft green grass near the water in a lotus pose, back straight and hands on his knees. Hanzo took his place beside him while the younger foxes rushed to the edge of the pond to search for the frog.

Zenyatta carefully set his singing bowl on a small cushion in the grass beside them, and he centered his breathing. He thought of a liquid light washing over his body and filling him, and all other beings, with a tender loving-kindness before picking up the light wooden stick of the singing bowl and gently tapping its rim. Around them a pleasant ringing reverberated, lingering in the stillness of the scene and indicating the start of the meditation.

_So, in emptiness, no form,_

_No feeling, thought, or choice,_

_Nor is there consciousness._

_No eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind;_

_No colour, sound, smell, taste, touch,_

_Or what the mind takes hold of,_

_Nor even act of sensing._

Zenyatta emptied his mind, focusing only on the whirl of the fans under his metal exterior and clearing any intruding thoughts as quickly as they came. Even he, an experienced practitioner of Buddhist meditation, was often plagued with unwanted thoughts. They never truly disappeared – he only got better at controlling them. The experience was humbling – it reminded him that all practitioners, no matter how skilled, always had obstacles to overcome.

Beside him, Zenyatta heard Hanzo shift, but he did not focus on the sound for long. He focused on the noise of the fans within him once more, perhaps the equivalent of a human focusing on their breathing. All practitioners were different, yet they were interconnected in the same ways.

Hanzo shifted again. And then again. Zenyatta could ignore it – he was skilled enough to overlook the distraction – but he decided against it. Hanzo was troubled by something, clearly, and it was best to address it.

“What is the matter?”

Hanzo slowly opened his eyes and shot an annoyed look at Zenyatta. “Nothing. I am meditating like you asked.”

“You are restless,” Zenyatta said. “You can tell me why.”

Hanzo shook his head and stared down into the waters of the pond. The foxes had given up on trying to catch the frog and instead curled up in a particularly strong patch of sunlight nearby. “I assure you, I am not restless.”

_No ignorance or end of it,_

_Nor all that comes of ignorance._

Zenyatta turned his gaze away from Hanzo and nodded slowly. The direct approach clearly would not work with the man – he had grown used to hiding his feelings. Zenyatta decided upon a different strategy.

“When I – when _we_ – lost Mondatta, I was overcome with some of the strongest emotions I’ve ever experienced,” Zenyatta began slowly. “Change causes us to suffer, but I had never suffered so strongly before. My feelings were so intense that I could not sit still or concentrate on any of the lessons that I had learned; meditating seemed impossible. The times when finding calmness is hardest are when we need to embrace calmness and impermanence the most, but such is easier said than done.

“Thinking of a loved one in danger is hard – it is a terrifying reminder that things can change at any moment. This suffering that you are feeling is something that I have also felt,” Zenyatta finished, turning his head to observe Hanzo.

The man’s face became dusted with red, similar to the wildflowers surrounding them. “I just care about him…about Jesse…I do not…I would not say I love him.”

Zenyatta held back a chuckle. “Loving-kindness is our most wonderful trait. There is no need to hide it.”

Hanzo shook his head but did not utter a retort. “If we’re helpless to stop impermanence,” he began instead, “then what should I be doing for Jesse instead…to protect him?”

“Sometimes you need to embrace solitude and think things over. I am proud of you for taking that step.”

Hanzo scoffed. “We are talking about people getting hurt because of our careless commander, and you just want me to sit and meditate the stress away?”

Zenyatta shook his head and called the foxes over to them. Somehow, animals always seemed to sit on the same wavelength as him, and the red foxes lazily wandered over. They stretched and made their new resting spot between Zenyatta and Hanzo, fur pressing against their thighs. “I just do not want you to act when such strong emotions are swirling around in your head,” Zenyatta finally said. “That is when we do something that we regret.”

Hanzo remained silent but pet the head of the fox next to him. The animal let out a high-pitched mewl and nudged against Hanzo’s palm. A hint of a smile formed on Hanzo’s face for a brief second.

“Have you considered other solutions to your problem?” Zenyatta asked.

“Such as?”

“You and Jesse could leave Overwatch.”

Hanzo sputtered and withdrew his hand back into his lap. “That’s absurd. I could not abandon—”

“—a cause that is not your own?” Zenyatta finished for him. “I am not saying that you need to abandon anything or anyone. You can simply work to embrace a different, yet congruent way of life in which your mind is not as strained.”

As Hanzo opened his mouth to speak, there the sound of footfalls was heard behind them. The fox against Hanzo’s leg lifted its head and perked its ears towards the new noise. Zenyatta turned to find Lúcio approaching, seemingly taken aback by the scene before him.

“Are those _wild_ foxes?” Lúcio asked in a whisper as he kneeled down next to the pair of meditators. He reached out and pet one gently before looking at both of Zenyatta and Hanzo in turn. “Sorry to interrupt – I thought I might find you two here.”

Zenyatta always felt boosted by Lúcio’s positive energy as if the man were a beam of sunlight energizing all who found themselves in his light and reminding them that there was always time to smile. “You are not interrupting,” he said. “Is something wrong?”

“Sorta…Not really a huge deal, though!” Lúcio said raising his hands defensively. Zenyatta could tell that he was nervous about delivering the news and wanted to water it down as much as possible. “Angela and I just got news that, uh…Agent McCree fainted of exhaustion on the field. He’s fine, but he’s on his way back…no biggie! Just thought that…I should tell you as soon as possible so there are no surprises.”

_No withering, no death,_

_No end of them._

Neither of them needed to look at Hanzo to know that he was seething with anger. He placed his face in the palms of his hands and shook his head. “He’s one man!” Hanzo shouted, startling the foxes. “And he – _Winston –_ puts the fate of the world on his shoulders along with a few others. It’s too much! You cannot fight this way and hope to outlast the enemy.”

Zenyatta reached out and set a hand on Hanzo’s shoulder. “Winston is a new leader. He sticks to listening to the people that he is familiar with, but he needs to engage with more diplomacy. Overwatch needs more allies, and that is not on you, Hanzo. If you were to take a break, I hope that it would be without guilt.”

Beside them, Lúcio suddenly burst into tears. Even Zenyatta was not prepared for sudden dramatic change in mood, and each of them reached out to put a comforting hand on the crying man, their gazes curious.

“This is all just so hard,” Lúcio said after a sob. “I didn’t think…I’m just so tired. We’re all so tired. I walk around and all of the agents look so depressed and dead inside. I try to help, but we’re all just so _tired_.”

Lúcio, one of the most optimistic agents at the Watchpoint, was even crumbling under the overwhelming pressure put on Overwatch. Zenyatta shook his head feeling defeat and hopelessness attack his mind, but his pushed them away. He watched as Hanzo slowly and awkwardly pulled Lúcio into an embrace as the man sniffled.

“It will be okay,” Hanzo said. “I will make sure of it. We will all be okay.”

Zenyatta reached and took one of each of their hands in his own. He was proud of Hanzo for having hope in the face of sadness and frustration, and he was proud of Lúcio for not keeping his feeling bottled up inside. “Try to meditate with me once more,” he whispered, and the other two men nodded.

Again, Zenyatta imagined a liquid golden light filling him as well as Hanzo and Lúcio, blanketing them in warmth and love. He expanded this vision to encompass every other agent, and then every other being on the face of the Earth. Beside him, Lúcio and Hanzo breathed deep in unison, the former man’s breath occasionally faltering as stray tears fell. The foxes again curled up between them and rested against their legs.

_Nor is there pain, or cause of pain,_

_Or cease in pain, or noble path_

_To lead from pain;_

_Not even wisdom to attain!_

_Attainment too is emptiness._

Then, Zenyatta tapped his singing bowl, allowing its peaceful chime to sound around them, and he let his mind go pleasantly blank.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And as always, just in case you wanna know, here's where I'm most active in the fandom! Come say hi if you want :) [@McEuropeskies](https://twitter.com/McEuropeskies)  
> 


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Five times that McCree had near-death experiences and made Hanzo worried sick, and the one time that the roles were reversed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Accidentally makes this chapter almost three times as long as the rest oops
> 
> I hope you enjoy the end to this fic. I took this chapter in a weird direction but I kinda like it. And thank you for your support!

**Angela**

Jesse McCree looked peaceful as he slept, as if all of the worries of his job simply faded away when he finally allowed his eyelids to fall shut. It had been a close call, and if Baptiste hadn’t been there to pull an unconscious McCree out of the path of enemy fire, then there was no telling what could have happened. Angela just wished that McCree had warned her of his tiredness ahead of time. Passing out in the middle of a battle field was never exactly ideal.

They were all always trying to push themselves, though. Angela should have seen the suffering in his face. The dark under-eye circles, the unfocused gaze…She should have forced McCree to take a break.

Angela stepped around Hanzo to take McCree’s blood pressure, tightening the nylon cuff around his bicep until it was more than a little snug. A pulse thrummed comfortingly in her ear when she pressed the end of her stethoscope to McCree’s vein. If he were awake, McCree would most certainly complain about her cold hands against his arm. Angela rolled her eyes simply at the thought.

Hanzo stretched for the first time in a while, a groan escaping his lips. For the length of the day, Hanzo had been like McCree’s shadow. He had remained silent, almost never moving from the other man’s side like he was in some sort of meditative state. He acted as neither a help nor a hindrance to her work, and so Angela allowed his quiet company.

When Winston came into the med bay to ask Hanzo and Angela to help finish off the mission in Paris, Hanzo didn’t even bat an eye before agreeing. His voice sounded hoarse and detached, and Angela moved her gaze to study his face. Hanzo looked tired, exhausted even. Strands of hair had slipped from his ponytail and sat messily along his jawline, and, for a moment, Angela thought that she saw a few more greys than normal in all of that sleek black hair.

Angela agreed as well; after all, what else could she say? Being on the field allowed her close quarters to her fellow agents, her family. If they were hurt, then she could immediately rush to their sides to patch them up. She hated the war, the violence, the constant bloodshed, but as long as those things were going on, she wanted to help those who suffered from the resulting pain. If all that she could do was act as a single bandage trying to stop a leak in a gargantuan dam, trying and failing to stop an onslaught of pain from leaking through, then that’s what she would continue to do.

After Winston left, Hanzo spoke to her for the first time since he had arrived at McCree’s bedside. He was so quiet that Angela had to lean in to hear him.

“Overwatch was a mistake,” Hanzo growled just loud enough for Angela to make out.

Angela took a step closer to the frustrated man and rested a hand on his shoulder. “Perhaps,” she said. “I’ve always said that Overwatch should be more involved with activism and diplomacy than with war, but…here we are.”

“But you don’t leave because you feel needed here. Obligated to be here, even,” Hanzo added.

Angela sighed, wondering if Hanzo was projecting onto her or if she was simply that easy to read. “My _methods_ are needed,” she said. “Overwatch funds my research, and I hope to eventually reach a point where I no longer need their funding and can extend my work ethically to all corners of the globe and to all organizations, even Null Sector. Until then, Overwatch and I mutually benefit each other.”

Angela met Hanzo’s gaze and thought to add, “Don’t tell Winston I said that.”

“Your secret is safe with me,” Hanzo said, chuckling. “I find it admirable.”

“You do?” Angela said, shocked to hear the man agreeing with what some may see as betrayal on her part.

“Certainly,” Hanzo continued. “Your goal is to heal others, not to serve any one organization. I wish that I had held my own ideals above my commitment to the Shimada Clan when I was younger. You are true in your determination.”

Angela stared at him, thoroughly moved by his complement. She longed to reach a point in her career in which her medicine was not tied to Overwatch. Then, she could perhaps have enough stability to begin her own organization, one focused on medically alleviating the root of all problems: pain and the anger that resulted from said pain. What some might see as her helping the enemy, Angela saw as an opportunity to calm the tides of suffering before war could even begin. To hear someone as duty-driven as Hanzo respecting her neutrality, her dedication to helping whoever she could rather than just those on the side of Overwatch, meant a lot to her.

“Thank you,” Angela finally said as Hanzo’s gaze shifted back to McCree.

Hanzo mumbled something else, something too quiet to hear, but for a moment she thought she had heard him whisper, “Thank you too.”

* * *

Hanzo, Winston, and Angela touched down in Paris as the sun was beginning to set. The warm streaks of color painting the sky would have been a sight to behold if not for the billowing plumes of smoke ascending from burning buildings in the Null Sector-controlled block of the city. Angela watched the orange flames mix with the colors of the horizon, asking herself why Null Sector would burn their own territory.

Did Overwatch start these fires? Were they the result of their crossfire?

Winston led them forward, reminding them of their new directive in Paris. After Genji, Hanzo, Lúcio, and McCree had disabled the bombs in the area, their security system was able to hone in on a new threat: an omnium far below them somewhere in the maze that was the Paris catacombs. It was there that Null Sector was mass producing battle drones in an effort to maintain some ounce of control in the city.

The main entrances to the underground labyrinth had been blown apart, blocked by hundreds of pounds of rubble that would be impossible to maneuver past in a short amount of time. “Luckily,” Winston told them with a proud look in his eyes, “we’ve found a secret entrance.”

Angela watched as Winston approached the door to what looked like an abandoned bar and knocked twice in a quick succession following with a delayed third knock. A tall, rusted omnic opened the door and quickly ushered them in with a gesture from his metal hand.

On the rotting wood of the old bar floor, Angela surveyed her surroundings. Old omnics with a purple and grey color scheme lined the bar stools, each of them missing various parts ranging from limbs to cooling units. One was leaking oil into a growing black puddle on the floor below. Angela quickly approached to find the source of the leak, and the omnic side-stepped her, suddenly favoring the farthest corner of the room.

They had to be old Null Sector units, and they didn’t trust her. Understandably so. None of them were speaking. If anything, they looked as if they were wondering why the three of them were lingering for so long. Angela turned to Winston with her eyes narrowed.

“We need to get Zenyatta and Brigitte down here,” she said to him. “Zenyatta can convince them to let us help, and Brigitte could fix them. We need to hurry.”

Winston looked back at her and nervously rubbed a hand down his face while shifting his weight from left to right. “Angela, we need to go and finish this. We need to make sure Paris is no longer a warzone. Please. There are people counting on us, and there can’t be more distractions.”

“Distractions?” Hanzo growled from the back of the room. Angela had almost forgotten that he was still there – he had a habit of being as quiet as a mouse at times. “Do you think helping is a distraction? That Agent McCree’s exhaustion was a _distraction?”_

Winston squeezed his eyes shut and put a palm to his forehead. “We’ll save more people by destroying the omnium. We need to produce visible results right now, Hanzo. We need the public to see that we’re helping them, that they can count on us, and Overwatch _doesn’t_ have time to dwell on the small things.” Suddenly, Winston raised his voice, as if a switch inside of him had suddenly flipped, letting all of his frustration flow free. “As much as I want to help everyone, I can’t! This is more about publicity than you can even imagine! If the public doesn’t support us, then we can’t do a thing! I shouldn’t even have to explain this to you right now! So are you coming with me or not?!”

Without waiting for an answer, Winston stomped down a small stairway to the basement below. “If you run your agents and everyone around you to exhaustion, then you definitely can’t do a thing,” Angela called after him, hoping with all her heart that he heard and dwelled on her comment.

Begrudgingly, Angela and Hanzo followed their commander to the floor below them and through a dark passageway that led to more stairs shaped from the hard dirt. The three of them switched on their flashlights and began the descent in an awkward silence. All the while, Angela thought about how much Winston had changed. Where he was once fun-loving and caring, he was now methodical and strict. She supposed that leadership and the constant pressure of being in the public eye had changed him, just as it had once changed Jack, but she couldn’t help but feel a strong disappointment.

Stealing a glance back at Hanzo who was walking a few steps behind her, Angela realized how much her perceptions of the agents around her had changed since the recall. She once found Hanzo’s criticism annoying and arrogant, but now she took comfort in his willingness to challenge authority. Many times, Angela had noticed, Hanzo was the one to voice all of the complaints that the agents had been thinking, albeit with a bit of underlying arrogance. Perhaps that was why McCree was so fond of him: he was never afraid to question orders and never went down without a fight. Both of them acted with some semblance of freedom within an organization where orders were final, and Angela would be lying if she said that she didn’t admire their stubbornness at least a little bit.

When they finally reached the bottom of the stairway, Angela couldn’t help but stare at the framework of the cold, dark tunnel. The dirt walls of the catacombs were lined with skulls and thousands of other bones from floor to ceiling. An occasional spider poked from the eyes of skulls and between the crevices of femur bones to hunt for their meals while a faint dripping sound echoed from some far corner of the eerie cemetery. They were almost engulfed in total darkness with only the three small beams of their flashlights to guide them.

“Okay,” Winston said, unable to hide the nervous break in his voice. “Throughout the course of this week, we’ve had agents maps the area, searching for paths to the omnium that hadn’t been blocked. So far, all pathways have been collapsed, and we’ve come into contact with some security traps, but we have one path left to check.”

Winston pulled out an electronic map illuminated with a lime green light. She noticed the dozens of red X’s crossing off tunnels that had presumably been destroyed before resting her gaze on a long yellow guide-arrow. The arrow directed them towards the last remaining pathway which would then lead them to a large, open cavern where the omnium was housed.

As the three of them continued on down the tunnel, they spotted many strange, haunting arrangements of bones that were characteristic of the Parisian catacombs. One had small bones arranged in a pyramid shape with a single skull resting on top. Another had three skulls smashed together with femur bones jutting from the bottom like spider legs. Angela felt a chill run up her spine.

“Why was Null Sector helping?” Hanzo finally asked, breaking the silence.

Winston rounded a corner and then glanced back at Hanzo. “We happened upon their safe house for injured forces. They were in no shape to fight us, so we offered them a deal. We agreed to keep them safe after the war ends if they gave us some information.”

“And if they hadn’t agreed to help?” Angela asked, trying to mask her disgust. Even after helping, the Null Sector units still hadn’t been provided with medical attention.

“…It’s a war, Angela,” Winston sighed, letting the conversation die.

After rounding another corner, Angela felt a jolt run through her body, almost like she had been quickly zapped by an electrical outlet. She let out a surprised yelp, and judging from Hanzo and Winston’s confused, slightly pained expressions, they had felt it too. Then, all at once, their flashlights blinked out, leaving them in total darkness. Angela felt her mechanical wings droop against her back and her armor suddenly felt much heavier than it had been minutes before.

She heard Winston huff in front of her. “I think we triggered a small EMP,” he mumbled. “Must have been another trap.”

Suddenly, Angela saw a soft blue light glowing from behind her. She turned with a start and saw Hanzo illuminated by the light that his tattoo was emitting. He smirked at her and Angela allowed herself a small chuckle, the two of them indulging in a moment of unity at knowing that Winston couldn’t do everything by himself. If their commander wanted to enact his mission, he had to have a healthy team of agents backing him. Angela hoped for the life of her that Winston came to understand that.

Hanzo squeezed in front of Winston, keeping his snide smirk in place. “If you will excuse me,” Hanzo said, “I’ll just lead the way. As long as that isn’t too much of a _distraction_ , of course. No worries, I memorized the rest of the directions.”

Angela had to admit that Hanzo’s saucy arrogance was goddamn hilarious at times. She followed behind him and noticed Winston hesitate before inevitably following at the back of the pack. It wasn’t long before they approached the large, fortunately well-lit cavern that had become home to Null Sector’s omnium. The three of them peeking from around the corner of the bone-adorned wall, they surveyed the surroundings.

Only four omnics were there guarding the smaller-than-average omnium. Three of them were average height, close to six feet tall. The fourth, however, was huge. He towered above all other occupants of the cave, even Winston. Black spikes protruded from his shoulders, a handlebar mustache was drilled to his face, and a long, darkened metal hairpiece shaped like a mullet sat atop his head. Angela couldn’t tell if he looked like a washed up punk rocker or a biker in the middle of a mid-life crisis.

“Hanzo, do you think your dragons could destroy that?” Winston asked, pointing at the already worn-down omnium. It was nothing compared to the large industry productions – Angela had witnessed Hanzo’s dragons ram through buildings much larger than this.

“Of course,” Hanzo said with a scoff. “But my dragons generate sparks, and judging from the smell of gasoline, I’d say the omnium is flammable. What if it were to explode?”

Angela watched Winston mull things over in silence, calculating the risks and rewards of such a stunt. “If it exploded, this whole tunnel would probably collapse,” Winston said after some time. “Could your dragons fly us out of here if that happened?”

“Wait, you _want_ him to blow it up?” Angela whispered with venom. If they didn’t warn the four omnics of the oncoming disaster, then they would have no chance of survival. Hanzo was looking at her with an arrow notched, waiting to hear what she had to say. “Can your dragons carry _all_ of us?”

Hanzo frowned, his gaze lingering on the large omnic for a worrying amount of time. “I sure hope so, but if not…you tell McCree I love him, alright?”

Angela stared as Hanzo loosed the single arrow, a blue streak flowing from its head, growing larger and larger until the breath-taking twin dragons emerged in an elegant spiral. The ancient beasts cut through the omnium with ease, tearing the engine and other vital parts to shreds. The four omnic guards watched in helpless horror and took a few steps back from the flaming carnage. As the dragons rounded back towards them, the suddenly flames erupted, a loud _boom_ rumbling the walls of the cavern. With red-hot fire licking at their heels, the omnics were scooped up by Hanzo’s dragons with immense grace and placed atop their scaly backs. Winston, Angela, and Hanzo were picked up next, and then the dragons raced through the cavern with a slithering motion. From the back of one of the dragons along with Winston and two of the smaller omnics, Angela looked back to find the ceiling of the tunnel caving in, the rubble progressing on them at a terrifying speed.

They approached the stairs that the three agents had descended not that long ago. As the dragon that Angela rode approached the top, she held onto fistfuls of fur for her dear life and scrunched her eyes shut, feeling a mortifying helplessness wash over her. Morbid visions of the thousands of skulls lining the walls of the catacombs flashed through her mind. Angela hated when fate felt out of her hands, when a patient’s symptoms were out of her control or when events could not simply be halted by the powers of medicine.

Then, in the fraction of a second, Angela felt the world around her still. When she opened her eyes, she was thrilled to see the ceiling above her stay in place, and below her Hanzo’s dragon lay panting on the cool floor of the bar basement. The relief that Angela felt in her chest subsided, however, when she noticed Hanzo’s absence.

Gasping, Angela ran to the stairway and was greeted with nothing but rubble.

* * *

Two minutes passed.

Two minutes for Angela to think about how to break the news to Genji, to McCree. Two minutes for her to be consumed by emptiness, the grief of losing a companion that she had not felt for a decade.

Two minutes for her to lose all faith in Winston.

It felt like a lifetime spent in a void, sinking deeper and deeper into its center.

Then, the rubble moved. It shifted back and forth as something pushed against it from the opposite end. Angela and Winston rushed to help clear the rubble until a large metal hand poked through to the surface. Angela hated that her heart sank at that.

It wasn’t Hanzo.

She cleared the rubble anyway, pulling rocks and pebbles away from the giant omnic. They cleared his head, then his shoulders. Tears that Angela hadn’t realized she’d been crying fell onto the rocks, leaving dark stains on the dirt that clung to them. It wasn’t until later that Angela saw in the omnic’s arms the third small omnic and a bleeding, unconscious Hanzo.

* * *

Angela stayed up all night tending to Hanzo’s extensive wounds. Her first order of business was the large gash along the man’s forehead – she cleaned and stitched it up, applying a thick layer of cream that would prevent infection and scarring.

X-rays showed Hanzo’s right arm broken in two different places. After cleaning the area, she fitted him for a cast knowing that Hanzo certainly wouldn’t be pleased when he woke up, whenever that may be. She hoped that it was soon.

Next was Hanzo’s broken neck. Luckily, his spinal cord had not been damaged, so there would be no long-term consequences. Angela placed a comfortable neck brace on the sleeping man before moving to clean up his more minor scrapes.

Mathieu, the omnic who had saved Hanzo, had said that he’d done so without a second thought but hoped that he never had to see their faces ever again. Angela vowed to help Mathieu and his injured friends, not for Overwatch or for Null Sector, but for the well-being of fellow sentient beings.

McCree, of course, was the first to visit, partly because he was still confined to the hospital bed next to Hanzo’s. The cowboy had stood when Hanzo first arrived, bombarding Angela with a million questions. Baptiste had calmed him down for the time being, but then, once he looked down at Hanzo in his casts and bandages, McCree began to cry.

“If I hadn’t…if I hadn’t left…” McCree choked out through sniffles. “It should’ve been me.”

“He loves you,” Angela said, not feeling at all guilty about revealing Hanzo’s feelings. He had asked her too, after all, and it was about time. “He took your place because he loves you. Imagine how worried he’s been about all of your constant injuries. You know he’d hate to hear you say that…that it ‘should have been you.’”

Through his tears, McCree allowed himself a smile. He bent over and placed a kiss on the top of Hanzo’s head, careful to avoid his bandages. Tears dripping onto Hanzo’s long hair, and it was minutes before McCree pulled his lips away.

“I love ya too, Hanzo,” he whispered just loud enough for Angela to hear.

* * *

Baptiste was next to visit. With him he brought a “get well soon” card and Te Jenjanm tea. “This was my Grann’s go-to cure for my sicknesses when I was a child,” he explained. “A cup of her ginger tea and I was feeling better, if only for a moment.”

Jack and Ana were next to drop by, oddly enough. Angela supposed that theyl had taken a liking to Hanzo during their missions together – the two had a habit of adopting a parent-like roles towards any stray agent that they saw. Gabe had been the same way.

Pulling up a chair to Hanzo’s bed, Jack cracked open a can of beer and drank it all in complete silence. Then, he left with a nod. He had never been good with feelings. Ana stayed behind and turned to McCree.

“I hope you’re not worried, Jesse,” she said. “Hanzo’s too stubborn to stay asleep for much longer.”

“Thanks, Ana,” McCree replied.

Ana took McCree’s had and gave it a squeeze before turning to leave. “He cares a lot about you.”

After that, Angela informed McCree that he could be discharged, knowing that there was no chance that he would leave Hanzo’s side anyway. McCree just stayed put in his hard reclining bed, his eyes never leaving the man beside him.

Zenyatta and Genji visited soon after. Genji shook his head and clicked his tongue when he saw his brother. Angela knew that they worried for one another, despite everything. Their bond was strong to have survived so much stress and betrayal, and now Angela knew that they simply wanted each other to be happy.

Genji and Zenyatta meditated peacefully nearby for a short time, and then Genji dropped off a bottle of sake before departing. “He’ll definitely need it,” Genji had said with a chuckle and then pointed to McCree. “You’ll be his nurse!”

Lúcio was the last visitor that Hanzo got that night. The man had red, swollen eyes when he entered the med bay – Angela had noticed that Lúcio was overcome with stress more often than not lately. They were all in need of a long vacation.

Lúcio played some soft tunes aloud on his portable speaker for Hanzo and McCree to listen to. Usually fun and talkative, Lúcio was extremely quiet. He asked Angela if she needed any help and then quickly retreated from the room with his head hung low.

Angela smiled thinking of all of Hanzo’s visitors. There had been a time when he’d had no friends on the base and only his estranged brother to keep him company. Slowly but surely, Hanzo’s personality had begun to shine through in recent months, and McCree was largely to blame. The cowboy had a habit of drawing jokes out of him and making him smile at the simplest of remarks.

 _They were a perfect match_ , Angela thought to herself as she took a seat on an especially cushiony couch. She monitored Hanzo’s vitals on her tablet once more before leaning her head back against the couch’s soft backing and letting her eyes drift shut.

* * *

She awoke to the sound of a hushed yet emotional conversation – she hadn’t even realized that she had fallen asleep. Stretching and rubbing her eyes, Angela looked across the room at Hanzo’s bed. McCree was hovering over the side and holding Hanzo’s healthy hand in his own while planting gentle kisses along his knuckles. It wasn’t until Angela heard Hanzo’s deep chuckle that she shot up, all remnants of sleep shaken from her body.

He was awake.

Angela rushed over to him just in time to hear Hanzo’s hoarse “I love you” spoken to McCree. They were so consumed by one another’s gaze that they didn’t even notice Angela come over to examine Hanzo’s vitals.

* * *

The next day, Angela was in Winston’s office demanding that Hanzo and McCree be given a long paid vacation while Winston apologized to her profusely. She felt for him, she truly did, but her patients came first.

Three weeks later, she and the other medics all received a postcard in the mail from Santa Fe, New Mexico, a lengthy thank-you note from Hanzo and McCree written on the back.

Angela smiled to herself, wishing that they enjoyed themselves and each other for as long as they could. That was all any of them could really hope for.

**Author's Note:**

> And as always, just in case you wanna know, here's where I'm most active in the fandom! Come say hi if you want :) [@McEuropeskies](https://twitter.com/McEuropeskies)  
> 


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